UTA MOVES 2050

Guiding UTA's Regional Access Into the Future

July, 2023

Purpose

Why Develop a Long Range Plan?

Continuing investments in transit are necessary to support our region’s rapid growth and expand access to schools, jobs, care centers, parks, and essential services for current and future residents.

Where and how we grow affects the transportation network. UTA is developing a Long Range Transit Plan for the next 30 years as a vision for the future of public transportation. This plan, UTA Moves 2050, focuses on understanding and responding to the needs of the community we serve today, tomorrow, and beyond.

UTA Moves 2050 Goals

Strengthen Partnerships

Strengthen partnerships with the communities UTA serves through collaborative plan development

Develop a Vision

Develop a system-wide vision for the future to meet anticipated community needs through transit improvements

Assess Needs

Assess long-term transit needs through data collection and analysis, as well as public engagement

Establish Strategies

Establish strategies to implement the plan goals by creating a financial analysis, identifying helpful partners, and seeking resources necessary to foster a successful project

As we move into the summer, we are focused on engaging with the community and developing a vision for the future of the UTA service area.

Project Framework

How does UTA Moves 2050 Help UTA Reach Its Strategic Goals?

Move Utahns to a Better Quality of Life

This plan makes it easier to move throughout the region by identifying specific areas right for transit to stop more often and go more places.

Achieve Organizational Excellence

As an agency, UTA builds a skilled, diverse, and well-resourced workforce that has opportunities to grow.

Exceed Customer Expectations

An increase in UTA’s ridership is an outcome of service reliability and reduced passenger delay.

Generate Critical Economic Return

UTA becomes a beacon for climate change mitigation by setting goals to reduce fleet emissions, improve air quality, and create transit-supportive community development to reduce vehicle dependence throughout the region.

Build Community Support

A new network focuses service expansion in high-growth areas with the most need to improve job and residential accessibility.

orange circle with three people and one person raising their hand with a bright idea

Planning for the Future

What's Happening in Our Region Today?

Where do you spend the most time? Where is your work or school? Where do you call home? Where do you need to go? Our region is both cohesive and diverse, calling for unique transit solutions to best serve Utahns from Brigham City to Santaquin. These questions shape the service UTA provides.

How Is Transit Serving Us?

To plan for the future, we look to how transit is serving us today to identify strengths and opportunities for our system. Today, UTA operates 82 bus and rail services, with much of our frequent service focused on areas with the highest population density and most jobs.

Ridership Recovery

After a challenging few years, Utahns have shown their need and desire to be back on transit, with UTA’s ridership throughout the region recovering faster than the national average. Explore this map to see where ridership has changed between 2019 and 2022. The results show the difference in number of riders per acre between the two years.

If you'd like to zoom in on other places within the study area, use the +/- button on the bottom right of the map. Click the button on the bottom left of the map to expand the map legend.

How Well Is Transit Serving Our Region?

Frequent routes are defined as routes with service every 15 minutes or better

A graphic that shows weekday service provided by UTA. This includes 87 total routes with 18 frequent routes.

A graphic that shows weekend service provided by UTA. This includes 64 total routes with 11 frequent routes.

A graphic that shows weekday service provided by UTA. This includes 34 total routes with 0 frequent routes. The graphics reflect fall 2022 route map.

What Is the Future of Our Region?

Our region is growing rapidly, which brings both challenges and opportunities. Where and how we grow affects the transportation network. UTA Moves 2050 works to address these impacts through visioning for the future. We’re working together to create a plan that best serves our region, and to be sure we’re all on the same page, we’ve laid out how our region will look in 2050 based on projections from the Wasatch Front Regional Council and Mountainland Association of Governments.

Which Places Throughout the Region Are Equity Focus Areas?

Transit is an important element of access and mobility for our community’s most vulnerable members. We are committed to prioritizing social equity in our future plans and projects. Areas highlighted in green on the map represent Equity Focus Areas.

How Do We Define an Equity Focus Area?

The Wasatch Front Regional Council (WFRC) identifies Equity Focus Areas as places that meet any of the following criteria:

Greater than 20% low-income Residents
Greater than 40% persons of color
Population density of 500 people per square mile or greater

Which Areas Will Best Support Transit?

Different neighborhoods can support different types of transit, whether it be on-demand service, buses that run mostly in the mornings or evenings, frequent bus and rail service, or something else. In order to support higher frequency transit, contiguous corridors of higher density land use must be present.

UTA has a range of potential investment strategies that are appropriate for supporting land uses that enhance mobility. The graphic below shows the types of service best suited for different activity densities.

This graphic shows the frequency recommended, type of corridor investment, market demand, passenger capacity, transit access shed, and stop/station amenities recommended for different types of transit operated by UTA or types of transit that will be operated by UTA in the future.

Which Areas Will Best Support Transit?

This map shows areas throughout the region where demographics and population density may support additional frequent service routes. You can slide between 2020 and 2050 to see which types of transit may be supported in certain areas now and in the future.

Hold the the white circle with the arrows in the center of the map and slide left to show more of the 2050 map and slide right to show more of the 2020 map. If you'd like to zoom in on other areas, use the +/- button on the bottom right of the map. Click the button on the bottom left of the map to expand the map legend.

Which Areas Will Best Support Transit?

Here’s an example of an area that supports a high level of service. Downtown Ogden, shown in dark blue on this map, is supportive of the existing frequent service provided throughout the area.

Which Areas Will Best Support Transit?

As another example, in Sandy, around the I-15 corridor, no frequent service currently operates. Because of dense housing development and a number of destinations, this area could be supportive of more frequent transit, especially as the region grows.

Draft Vision

UTA Moves 2050 includes four investment strategies designed to improve mobility

Maintain Our System
Enhance Our System
Expand Our Frequent Service Network
Serve Growth Areas

Maintain Our System through updating bus fleet to go green, corridor preservation, state of good repair, workforce support, and maintenance and new facilities.

Enhance our System through new types of service info, targeted capital improvements, commitment to improving technologies, and fast and reliable service

Expand Our Frequent Service Network through a network of up to 45 frequent routes and more frequent FrontRunner service and TRAX service

What does the Draft Vision Network accomplish?

The UTA Moves 2050 Vision Network is designed to provide more service, more choices, and an easy-to-use system over the next 30 years.

The Vision Network enhances existing service while identifying key capital investments to support regional growth in the coming decades. It uses the four UTA Moves 2050 investment strategies— Maintain Our System, Enhance Our System, Expand Our Frequent Service Network, and Serve Our Growth Areas—to identify and prioritize projects throughout the UTA region.

Here's our Draft Vision with different features such as TRAX, FrontRunner routes and stops, Limited-Stop Service, Frequent Service, Local Service, and Seasonal Routes highlighted on the map. As you scroll, you'll see investments in all parts of the UTA Service Area.